Scale up, speed up jabs: WHO to SE Asia region
NEW DELHI: As more countries confirmed the prevalence of highly transmissible variants of Covid-19, the World Health Organization (WHO) on Sunday issued an advisory for countries in Southeast Asia to scale up and rigorously implement public health measures, along with efforts to accelerate vaccination against the disease in order to prevent another surge.
“We need to continuously strengthen our efforts to test, trace and isolate. Societal interventions such as physical distancing, hand hygiene and proper wearing of masks need to be stringently implemented. These measures should be in full force and for longer periods in areas reporting more transmissible variants of concerns,” said Dr Poonam Khetrapal Singh, regional director, WHO Southeast Asia.
Earlier this week, Maldives and Myanmar confirmed transmission of variants of concern that have already been confirmed in India, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Timor-leste.
The variants of concern, along with the opening up of economies and societies, have contributed to the recent surge in cases globally.